Japan Imported US Oil First Time in 4 Years

Japan imported U.S. oil for the first time in four years as companies find ways around a four-decade ban on American exports and the Asian nation seeks to cut its dependence on Middle East suppliers.

Japan, which relies on Saudi Arabia for 33 percent of its supply, imported about 300,000 barrels of oil from the U.S. last month, the first shipments since at least June 2010, according to data from the Ministry of Finance. Cosmo Oil Co. last month received the country’s first cargo of U.S. condensate, a lightly processed form of crude, Katsuhisa Maeda, a Tokyo-based company spokesman, said today.

A surplus of light, sweet crude from shale formations has boosted U.S. production to the highest in more than three decades and spurred exports. That’s reshaping decades-old trading routes and helping Asian refiners diversify away from some members of OPEC, which meets today amid speculation the group is losing influence in global oil markets.

“The exports of processed condensate to Asia increases regional supply to the benefit of refiners who can then diversify their sources of crude oil,” said Andy Lipow, president of Lipow Oil Associates LLC, an energy consulting firm in Houston. “I expect the U.S. will be exporting close to 300,000 barrels per day of processed condensate by the end of 2015.”

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Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency
trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.

MarketPulse is a forex, commodities, and global indices analysis, and forex news site providing timely and accurate information on major economic trends, technical analysis, and worldwide events that impact different asset classes and investors.

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